


if you love me don't let go

by alexanger



Series: if you love me: [1]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: M/M, ghosts and other spooky shit, jk its not spooky its just gay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-09
Updated: 2017-05-09
Packaged: 2018-10-29 21:04:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10862064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alexanger/pseuds/alexanger
Summary: aaron and alexander reconnect after weehawken.[title]





	if you love me don't let go

We are all born alone. Aaron remembers this in his darkest moments. It seems silly - but we are all born with no language, no concept of _other,_ just the concept of ourselves and of yawning emptiness where before there was only warmth and darkness.

We are all born alone. Aaron remembers this when he is at his worst.

 

* * *

 

It’s hard to imagine a world without Alexander Hamilton in it. Aaron wonders if it will be quiet, or if Alexander’s voice will follow him. He wonders if it will echo in the back of his mind, the dark secret places where he hides his love and his pain and the most tender parts of his heart, the same way the report of the gun is echoing in his ears.

Aaron doesn’t know for sure that Alexander is dead. Hit doesn’t mean dead. On the ground doesn’t mean dead.

He runs but Van Ness grabs him. “Don’t,” he says.

Pendleton is staring at him.

“I need to see,” Aaron says. “If he’s hurt -”

“You’ve shot him. It’s done. We need to go _now.”_ Van Ness tugs at his arm. “Burr, come _on._ It’s _done.”_

“It can’t be done,” Aaron insists. “It’s never done with him. He’s never done.”

“If you say so,” says Van Ness.

“He’s _never_ done. He isn’t finished yet. You’ll see,” says Aaron.

 

* * *

 

It has never hurt more to be wrong.

 

* * *

 

No matter where he travels or what he does, Alexander follows him. Aaron travels down to Mexico and away to Europe and he makes some terrible decisions and everything he does, every move he makes, Alexander is there in his mind.

“Leave me be,” Aaron says sometimes under his breath, but he can still hear that irritating nasal drone: _Fucking up again, are we, Burr? Let me add this to my list -_

Aaron keeps the list of grievances Alexander penned so many years before. It’s a relic of their exceptional rivalry. At the core of it, they were the same, the two of them: both ready to climb, both terrified to fall. The only difference was that Alexander could never shut his fucking mouth.

In the end, that was what did it, wasn’t it?

No. Aaron was what did it.

He wonders idly if it’s worth his time to write to Alexander’s family and apologize. Every time he sits down, though, he finds himself writing a very different letter instead. Each one begins with _Dear Alexander:_

_Dear Alexander:_ the first one reads. _By now I can’t imagine there’s much of you that remains. I’m glad I never saw your body. I can’t imagine that I would recognize you with your mouth closed._

It’s morbid and macabre and awful but he finds some solace in it. _You’re more alive even now than I have ever been. How do you do it, Alexander? How do you have a voice even now that you’re gone? Your name is alive and no one will ever forget you. Your wife is making damn sure of that._

_Your name will live far longer than you did. I wonder if we’ll ever stop speaking it._

He never does speak it, though. He never says Alexander’s name out loud. It feels like some sort of blasphemy; he can’t profane that beautiful name with his sinner’s tongue.

If Alexander is Icarus, what does that make Aaron? He isn’t the sun, he isn’t nearly bright enough; the sun is Alexander’s ambition, his refusal to stop.

No, Aaron is the wings. If you glance at him, he seems to hold up - but when you look close enough you realize there’s no substance to him. He’s all falseness and glamour with nothing beneath the surface.

And he’s the reason Alexander is dead.

 

* * *

 

_Dear Alexander:_

_The weather here is abysmal but I doubt that would have any impact on you, all things considered. I’ve been absolutely miserable. The rain has been steady and severe enough that it restricts me from going out to occupy myself, so I’ve been stuck at home. Thank goodness I have things to read but I should be doing so much more than this._

_I’ve thought about you every day since Weehawken. I wonder if, wherever you are, you think about me. Perhaps you don’t have the ability. If you do, maybe you’ll forgive me. Maybe you won’t. Either way, I will understand._

 

* * *

 

Life seems emptier without something to fight against. Life seems meaningless without someone butting up against him at every turn. He finds himself wondering just what sort of love he harbours for Alexander. Is it the devoted love of a comrade in arms? The passionate, deep-seated love for an enemy? Or is it -

He aches to leave something on Alexander’s grave. Instead of burning his letters, he bundles them together and keeps them, hoping that one day he might visit Alexander where he lies. Aaron imagines greeting the tombstone the way he would greet an old friend. He wonders what’s inscribed on the stone. Doubtless it’s something clever Alexander had said, or something brilliant written down and squirreled away in a desk drawer or an old journal. The man was never at a loss for great things to say.

Aaron wonders what it feels like to be that full of brilliance. It must be very loud, he imagines, loud and full of dazzling light. How could one man hold so many words?

It must hurt terribly to be so full. He knows this because it hurts terribly to be so empty.

 

* * *

 

_Dear Alexander:_

_Your pretty wife has made quite a name for herself, I hear. She’s taken to raising children that haven’t anyone else to raise them. I admire her for that and for her resolution; the Lord knows I wouldn’t have the patience, especially not at this age._

_I wonder how you would have ended up had you had someone like her to raise you. Do you recall when we met? How you told me within the first few minutes of our conversation that you were an orphan? You had such hunger in your eyes. What were you hungry for? Did you ever find it?_

_Have you found it now?_

 

* * *

 

Years roll behind him and become dust. The curious thing is that, as time goes by, he feels a little less alone.

It isn’t a very overt thing, but sometimes he’ll turn and catch the flash of a shadow just out of the corner of his eye. Little things that have gone missing turn up when he looks for them next. He doesn’t seem to need to refill his ink pots as often. One morning, he opens his front door to find a little cluster of sky-blue flowers, weeks too early in the season.

Aaron doesn’t allow himself the luxury of believing that part of Alexander is still with him, but the idea seems to lurk in the furthest recesses of his mind and to surface whenever he least expects it. It tends pop up while his mind is idle, which is often, this day.

Alexander always looked stunning in blue. A pity he didn’t wear the colour more often. Perhaps it lost its appeal after the war; as resplendent as Alexander was in his blue coat, it must have been a terrible weight on him. That coat can’t have meant much more to Alexander than bloodshed and anger and fear once the fighting was over, can’t have meant much more than the friends he lost and the men he had to sacrifice along the way. Aaron had disposed of his own for the very same reason. But those blue flowers - those little tiny ones - those, Aaron thinks, Alexander would have liked.

He muses on blood soaking into earth. Do flowers spring up where dead soldiers once lay?

What has sprung up where Alexander fell?

At any rate, he begins to talk to thin air when he’s by himself. It isn’t as though he’s gone mad, he tells himself; he knows, of course, that Alexander won’t reply. It’s simply comforting to pretend he’s talking to his old friend when there’s no one else around to endure his rambling.

“Thank you for the flowers, Alexander,” Aaron murmurs when he finds another cluster of them.

\- _You’re welcome,_ the air seems to sigh.

Ah. Perhaps he is going mad after all.

“About damn time,” says Aaron. “I’ve been trying to get through to you for years.”

 

* * *

 

_Dear Alexander:_

“Why am I writing these still if you can hear me?” Aaron asks.

_“It keeps me close. I need a link to hold on to. Don’t stop.”_

“Alright,” says Aaron, “but don’t expect me to read them out to you. You can read them yourself.”

_“One might think you could show me some kindness, considering how long I’ve been without any sort of conversation.”_

“Point taken.”

_Today you began to talk to me,_ he writes. _I wonder if this time I’ll actually want to listen._

_(Of course, you know I kid - I have been waiting so long to hear your voice again, my dearest friend.)_

“How long have you been following me, Alexander?” Aaron asks. He finds it a little disconcerting to converse without seeing his partner, but there’s nothing to focus on, no direction in which to aim his gaze. Instead, he looks steadily at the paper he’s been writing on.

“ _Since your first letter. You’ve done some terribly foolish things, haven’t you?”_

“Of course,” says Aaron. “Someone has to do foolish things and you have been - indisposed.” He pauses, then adds, “my condolences.”

“ _No need, Burr. One would expect I could finally get some peace, but I see it isn’t to be - give me your condolences for_ that, _if anything.”_

He can’t help the laughter. It bubbles out of him unchecked, a spring becoming a geyser, and then the laughter turns to sobbing. Aaron can’t rein it in, can’t control it; it steals the breath from his lungs and crushes at the inside of his chest and it _hurts._ Oh, God, it hurts.

_“Burr -”_

There’s warmth heavy against him, not unlike an arm slung over his shoulders. For a moment, there’s the hint of the scent of grass, an ocean breeze, wood warped by water and salt.

“I’ve missed you terribly,” is all Aaron can say.

 

* * *

 

_Dear Alexander:_

_What is there to say so early in the mornings? I suppose I could tell you my dreams._

_I dreamed of what I did to you. I dreamed of the way it felt afterwards, the way the world went fuzzy and ethereal and how I couldn’t focus on anything but you, your face, your voice. I used to imagine what you’d say, if you could have said anything to me. Last night I dreamed you refused to speak to me._

_I fear that most of all, now. It’s only been a handful of days since you made contact but already, you’ve become my reason for being. I have little else nowadays, you know. I don’t know how you’ve forgiven me but I’m so thankful that you have. Were you to disappear again, I don’t know what I’d do. The world is so much colder without you in it._

“What did you do to me?” asks Alexander. His voice has become far less spectral, far more solid.

Aaron doesn’t speak for a moment. “What do you mean?” he manages finally.

“I don’t remember much. If you write it, I can connect to it - you say my wife raises orphans now. I can envision that, I can remember who she is, but not much else … we had children, didn’t we? I don’t recall my life. I need you to tell me - the links are gone …”

Aaron can see Alexander now. He’s hazy, more colour than form, but he’s _there._ It makes a tremendous difference. Every so often, there’s touch between the two of them. Aaron has been craving touch for so long.

“I wronged you,” Aaron says. “Badly. Let’s leave it at that.”

“But -”

“Please,” says Aaron.

“Alright,” says Alexander, but he has that _tone,_ the one that means he doesn’t intend to leave it at all.

Aaron writes down his dreams every morning. It’s easier than coming up with something new to tell Alexander in his daily letters. At the end of each one, he jots down a quick memory to give to Alex, something pleasant to hold: Sunny fields, the ones they took breaks in during the war. The night Alexander met Eliza. The camaraderie between Alexander, Hercules, John and Gilbert. The first time Alexander and Aaron smiled at each other and meant it.

One morning, Aaron writes, _I tremble to put into words what I dreamt last night … suffice it to say it was incredibly improper and that I would not have allowed such things to occur had I been in possession of my wits. Dreams are not to be controlled, though, and so I had to let it happen -_

“What happened, Burr?” Alexander asks.

Aaron startles. “Nothing,” he says.

“You’re writing to me. I can understand every word, you know. What happened? Did you dream of a woman, perhaps? Some carnal relation? Is that why you’ve been so strange this morning?”

“No, I -” Aaron begins to protest.

“You could hire a woman, you know. I’d give you your privacy. Had I the ability to partake in the pleasures of the flesh, I assure you that I would -”

“It wasn’t a woman, Alexander,” says Aaron, and suddenly he realizes exactly what he’s implied.

“A man, then,” says Alexander. “So? Hire a man. It isn’t much of a difference.”

“How do you -”

Alexander laughs. “I don’t suppose I have any reputation to maintain now, do I? So who cares if I disclose my less .. shall we say, less _proper_ friendships? Laurens and I were lovers. It wasn’t a terribly well-kept secret. Does that make you feel less embarrassed about your dream? It’s all subconscious desires, you know. It isn’t anything you chose and so it’s nothing to feel shame about.”

“Ah,” says Aaron.

“Who was it? Anybody I know? Or, knew, I suppose.”

Aaron is silent.

“Who was it, Burr?” repeats Alexander.

There are still no words. Aaron gazes at his hands.

There’s warmth, suddenly, and then colour as Alexander comes closer. “Who was it?” he asks softly. He’s solid enough that Aaron can see the outlines of his beard. Dear face. Dear man.

“I think you know,” he whispers.

And Alexander puts a hand under his chin, and there’s warmth against his lips.

It’s not a kiss - not quite - but it’s close enough.

**Author's Note:**

> comments and kudos bring my dead ghost bf back to smooch me. chat to me at [alexangery.tumblr.com](http://alexangery.tumblr.com) and consider [buying me a coffee](https://ko-fi.com/A02514GB)


End file.
